Wednesday, May 16, 2018

Violent Ken and Help Sought

Greetings Warriors and Scholars!

Did you go out for free comic book day? I did! I went to my local shop, grabbed my 3, ran into some friends, and we went to a few hobby and gaming stores. Of my 3 comics, one of my choices was the Street Fighter Ultra issue. This story is a Ken-centric story written by Ken Sui-Chong, artwork by Hanson Steinbach, and lettering by Marshall Dillon. He has just gotten back from a battle in another realm against Lord Raptor, but is now faced with his own darkness. He often becomes Violent Ken with an insatiable appetite for maiming and killing others.

In Street fighter lore, the Satsui No Hado is essentially the Dark Side. It is the worst of the person given full energy and comes out with complete inhibition. This is discussed by my co-author, Nathan Marchand, in entry 17 of our book, 42:Discovering Faith through Fandom.

What I found interesting in this comic was Ken's interactions with 2 students at a Gouken's Dojo in Japan. Sakura and Dan both share what helped them come out if it.

For Sakura, it was friendship. Apparently that story can be found in the Super Street Fighter series. You have heard the phrase: "No man is an island," right? Exactly. We are communal creatures. Proverbs 27:17 tells us "As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another." Do you have anyone who will speak honestly to you about your issues, be it sin or difficult life times?

Dan has another story, found in Street Fighter Unlimited. He shares that foregivenss is what changed him. When Jesus teaches his disciples to pray, something we call "The Lord's Prayer" or the "Our Father," there is one statement in there that He expounded on. "Forgive us, as we forgive each other." He goes on to tell us if we do not give foregiveness, God won't give it to us.

Ultimately, Jesus exemplified both of these qualities. He forgave the man who could not walk for his sin as well as the thief on the cross next to Him and Peter for betraying Him. He challenged our perceptions of how we should treat each other and protected the woman at the well from being stoned by men who had their own sin issues to deal with.


2 comments:

  1. Bingo. Two of our most fundamental needs alongside things like food and shelter, are purpose and community, and our ultimate purpose is to serve our community. God even outright says (...and Jesus outright lives) that love and justice is all about meeting needs no matter what deeds have been done. *Satan* is the one trying to convince us that what we get should be based on what we've done. The fact that the Devil's system ended up torturing to death the only Person who had only ever done good proves how ultimately unjust that idea of justice is.

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  2. Yep. We are made to be in community and that is how we work best. Some of my healthiest times were when I was living in community instead of at home(such as when I did a discipleship school with YWAM)

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